India exodus result of unchecked websites

Ethnic clashes in the Indian state of Assam have prompted panic nationwide, causing hundreds of thousands of people to flee from the south of the country where they work.

Wary of social networking sites' ability to spread rumors, New Delhi has asked websites including Facebook and Twitter to come up with IP addresses suspected of spreading rumors. Pressed by the Indian government, these websites have signaled a willingness to "cooperate." Opinions in India vary from urging the government to strengthen Internet censorship to concerns over freedom of speech.

The scene is familiar to Chinese. What happened in India can help us understand more objectively whether the Internet can foment social instability and how it does so. The exodus was a result of public panic that was easily ignited by rumors. It takes more than working with social networking websites to appease the agitated public and prevent this from happening again.

But New Delhi's worries that the Internet promoted the rumors didn't come out of nowhere. As the inventor of social networking sites, the US has experience in regulating them. But these websites have caused disturbances in other countries. The unrest in the UK last summer exposed the side effects of these networking sites, prompting the government to ponder blocking Internet information flow in times of emergency, a decision that led to an outcry.